POlitically correct response to a stutter

  • Thread starter Thread starter Mat
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well, you obviously stand there with a smug grin on your face and wait for them to spit it out as you are superior. if they're taking too long say words such as 'yeeeeeeees' or 'aaaaaaaaand'?
 
paul at my work has a stutter, i never let him finish, i would be there all day FFS.

nice guy our paul, but as is common with peeps who stutter, he has a hell of a temper.

anyways there is no excuse nowadays for a stutter, there are too many therapies to help peeps, the reason they still stutter is lazyness.

i told paul this and he agrees, to busy going out drinking with his mates, getting into fights, to go to speech therapy.

he recently got a vodka glass in the face, cut his nose and forehead. I asked him what happened, and i swear i was there for nearly a half hour, i didnt let him finish 20 times in that convo. :rolleyes:
 
I love some of the responses in this thread, total *****.

As a person who stammers, might I offer my views:-

try not to finish people's sentences for them, are you sure you know what they are going to say?

Try to maintain relaxed eye contact with the person, a stammerer will often break eye contact because of embarrassment anyway.

Don't say them "spit it out", "slow down" etc

You can talk about the elephant in the room, people will often go to extreme lengths not to mention or draw attention to a person's stammer.

It is International Stammering Awareness Day on Monday 22nd October 2012, we are holding an exhibition at The Point, Doncaster, feel free to pop along.
http://www.stammering.org/events_doncasterart.html
 
Used to have a bad stutter and people normally waited for me :p but way around it for me was to replace it with another word with same meaning but get kinda stuck when got to peoples name.
 
Interesting replies, thanks.

This thread was written off the back of an incident at work where a chap was asking for a colleague of mine, who shares the same office as me, hence I knew who he was asking for even though he couldn't finish the name.

This also took place over the phone so I'm not sure whether that makes it harder to know how to deal with a stutter when all you can do is either sit there in silence or interrupt... I chose the former and nothing came of it but it did prompt the thought and subsequently this thread...
 
Mat said:
Interesting replies, thanks.

This thread was written off the back of an incident at work where a chap was asking for a colleague of mine, who shares the same office as me, hence I knew who he was asking for even though he couldn't finish the name.

This also took place over the phone so I'm not sure whether that makes it harder to know how to deal with a stutter when all you can do is either sit there in silence or interrupt... I chose the former and nothing came of it but it did prompt the thought and subsequently this thread...
Click to expand...

There are 2 main types of stammer, an overt stammer e.g. were sounds are repeated , prolongation of sounds or blocking where a stammerer cannot get articulate the word.

Also you can have a covert stammer, this is were a stammerer will change or substitute words he or she thinks he will stammer on for words they feel they speak. I know a few covert stammerers and it is very difficult for them because they are continually thinking ahead when they speak, trying to avoid feared words, and it is mentally very tiring.

I am an overt stammerer.
 
Another stammerer over here :)

My job is heavily telephone based (IT Service Desk) and I find it incredibly rude if I block having answered the phone and somebody decides they can't wait for me to finish and carries on talking anyway. The worst thing is, I see most of these people on a regular basis and having worked there for 18 months, everybody knows that I stammer.

Having people repeating "hello" at you just makes it 10 times worse. If I'm lucky enough to get a word out or make a sound (very bad habit, but I use the word 'erm' at the start of sentences to allow me to bounce off it), some people will then butt in and start talking over me because they know I'm there.

Of course, this is only a small minority of people. Most are very patient and wait for me to finish.

On the other hand, there are people who'll finish sentences off without even thinking about it, they'll do it to everybody. They're not singling out people who stammer... even I've done it when speaking to fluent people. It's quite easy to tell who's doing it out of habit and who's doing it to 'help you out' though ;)

I don't think any of my close friends have actually ever finished my sentences off for me, so because of that, the way I'd like to be treated is for people to be patient and let me finish. It may make the stammerer worse if they think they have to force the words out and beat the listener to the end of the sentence.
 
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We have a regular customer at work with a reaaaaaallly bad stutter, when he comes in, the job description takes an absolute age. Most of the time we wait for him to finish or reword it but sometimes I finish the word off for him. :D
I'm talking a good 30 seconds per word sometimes!! The office goes silent in anticipation :o

C c c aaan I geg ge get a 30k ser ser ser ser ser ser ser ser ser
****ing stutter.
30k service done please.

:eek:

Poor ****** :(
 
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I'm sure those who stutter are more than used to the situation and are well aware that others may feel awkward or not know how to react. In the past I have let the person reach their own natural conclusion of a sentence - I've never been in a situation where a stutter has gone on for a prolonged period of time.

Just roll with it - those who stutter deserve the same level of respect and politeness as those who don't :)
 
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